In the only suspenseful race left in the seasonal adults 18-49 race is which network will finish third. ABC, in fourth, needs to beat NBC by, on average, 0.245 ratings points / week to overtake NBC in third place by the end of the season. ABC exceeded that margin last week beating NBC by 0.5 points, slightly decreasing the margin required in future weeks. For those keeping score at home (or in Burbank), the current unrounded gap between NBC and ABC's adults 18-49 averages is 0.1638 ratings points.

Fox will finish first among broadcast networks in the advertiser important adults 18-49 ratings for the 2010-11 season, and CBS will finish second. CBS fans can whine all they want about the unfair advantage of the Super Bowl, but even without it Fox would almost certainly have passed CBS, theSuper Bowl just sped up the timetable.

2010-11 Season to Date Ratings

Fox will finish in first place and currently has a 3.4 18-49 rating average. (Without the Super Bowlthey'd have about a 2.9 average)

CBS will finish in second place and currently has a 3.0 adults 18-49 average.

NBC is in third with a 2.6 rating average.

ABC is in fourth place with a 2.4 rating average.

CBS remains well ahead in the press release friendly, but revenue meaningless, season to date average viewership.

2010-11 Season vs. 2009-2010 Season

For the 2010-11 broadcast primetime season to date vs. last season at the same week:

ABC is DOWN 10.3% vs. last season's adults 18-49 average.

CBSisDOWN 10.3% vs. last season's 18-49 average. If I somewhat crudely remove the ratings effect of Super Bowl week 2010, CBS would be DOWN 1.6% vs. last season.

CWisUP0.6%vs. last season's adults 18-49 average. What the chart doesn't show is that the CW is down 13% in the women 18-34 demo they publicly claim to target.

Foxis DOWN 7.1% vs. last season's adults 18-49 average. If I somewhat crudely remove the ratings effect of Super Bowl week 2011, Fox would be DOWN 19.9% vs. last season.

NBC is DOWN 3.2% vs. of its adults 18-49 average compared to last season at this point. The comparisons have begun vs. the 2 week portion of last season that included the Winter Olympics, and they'll get increasingly grim for the next two weeks. After week 23, I will also produce a crude comparison vs. last season without the Winter Olympics.

UnivisionisUP7.5% vs. last season's adults 18-49 average.

Notes: The CW replaced one hour of their schedule last season (10%) that was a scheduled repeat with an original series this season. NBC is spending a lot more this season in primetime after replacing 5 hours of The Jay Leno Show with mostly scripted dramas.

Note that the % increases and declines calculated for the chart above use the average total viewership and the average adults 18-49 viewership, NOT the adults 18-49 ratings rounded to a single digit past the decimal point.

Broadcast network primetime season vs. season ratings overall: My calculation (using Nielsen data) of the average adults 18-49 ratings season to date for the 5 English broadcast networks is down7.6%vs. the season to date ratings average through the same week of the 2009-10 season.

Each rating point is a percentage of the US TV population in that demographic group. A 1.0 adults 18-49 rating equals 1.315 million adults 18-49

The network's average viewership is charted in millions of viewers, just like we report all other average viewership information on the site, and adults 18-49 is charted as ratings points. Note the units (million viewers on the left, rating on the right) below the bars.

Note that these season average ratings are "Most Current" measurements which are Live+7 day DVR viewing when available (2+ weeks after airdate), combined with LIve+Same Day DVR viewing for the most recent 2 weeks.